After a ton of speculation, a bit of denial, and a ton of testing we finally have our answer. The thermal interface material change made by Intel when it went from Sandy Bridge to Ivy Bridge is indeed the cause of the excessive temperatures we’ve observed while overclocking. The first accusation was made in late-April by Overclockers.com, however proving it wasn’t easy. The Japanese division of PC Watch somehow managed to remove the integrated heat spreader from a Core i7 3770k, along with the stock binding and grease. They then proceed to replace it with aftermarket alternatives, and the results speak for themselves.

If those spiffy new Kepler-based GTX 680 graphics cards do in fact end up hitting the streets tomorrow, as has been widely rumored, enterprising overclockers will no doubt be looking to tweak their new hardware to even higher levels of performance. Boosting core frequencies should be a cinch for owners of MSI-brand GTX 680s; the company joined forces with Guru3D to release a new Beta version of its Afterburner overclocking utility, complete with support for Kepler GPUs.

Throwing caution to the wind and dousing his AMD processor and G.Skill Extreme RipjawsZ memory kit in liquid nitrogen, Christian Ney, the well-regarded Swiss overclocker, set a new memory frequency record as recognized by HWBot's Professional Overclockers League. The record for DDR3 memory now stands at 3,736MHz, the highest frequency every achieved, besting the previous record of 3,600MHz.

Conflicting reports about Intel's Ivy Bridge launch and a full or partial delay are casting a cloud over the Santa Clara chip maker's successor to Sandy Bridge, but regardless of when it comes out, there's plenty of reason to be excited. For one, Ivy Bridge is being built on a 22nm manufacturing process using 3D transistors, which boils down to more performance and lower power consumption than today's 32nm Sandy Bridge parts. It adds a new graphics subsystem, natively supports SuperSpeed USB 3.0, and introduces other improvements. But the real reason to get excited is because of the potential overclocking headroom.

Few acts manifest the Maximum PC ethos as much as overclocking. Overclockers with something to prove have long been able to post their various benchmarking scores on HWBot to determine the king of the processor-pushing hill; now, that drive for MOAR can earn more than just bragging rights. Gigabyte just announced it has teamed up with HWBot for the "Gigabyte Spring Extreme Competition." Tinkerers with Gigabyte mobos and AMD processors are invited to try to push their systems to the (almost) breaking point, and the three people with the most prolific overclocking prowess will earn brand-spankin'-new Bulldozer-friendly mobos.

Boutique system builder CyberPowerPC claims it's the first U.S. computer manufacturer to offer Intel's Performance Tuning Protection plan, which gives reckless or unlucky overclockers the opportunity to take a one-time mulligan on an overclock-gone-bad and receive a replacement processor. Intel charges a nominal fee (compared to the cost of a replacement processor) for the added protection, but CyberPowerPC's offering it for free on select setups.

Picture this: You're driving along in a remote area clear of people, animals, and other cars. There's a posted speed limit with a couple of bullet holes in it. Do you tap the break and adjust your speed accordingly, or take a potshot of your own at the sign and slam the gas pedal in defiance? No matter which way you answer it, PowerColor has a Radeon HD 7950 SKU tailored just for you.

EVGA this week rolled out a new version of its Precision "Advanced Graphics Tuning" software, a utility used to monitor your graphics card(s) and overclock. Four sliders let you adjust the core clockspeed, shader clockspeed, memory clockspeed, and fan speed on up to four GPUs, while temps and speeds are displayed in a real-time monitor on the left-hand side of the UI.

A quick glance at Kingmax's memory lineup quickly reveals that the company likes to kick it old school with 'naked' RAM modules. Even Kingmax's new high performance Nano Gaming RAM for gamers and overclockers abstain from using heatspreaders and bare all while running around in quad-channel configurations at DDR3-2200MHz.

AMD is expected to launch its Radeon HD 7950 graphics card in a little less than two weeks from now on January 31, 2012, for around $400 to $450, if the Internet rumors prove true. In the meantime, Sapphire apparently has an overclocked version in the works, with several official looking picture having been leaked to the Web.